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I?ve bought plenty of things from WH Smiths in the past but that was only in the store. I?d never gone online with them because they?re prices generally weren?t the best when you consider that delivery is £2.00 on top of whatever you buy. However if you?re prepared to wait a few more days then you ca get stuff delivered to your local store for no extra charge. You can then pick up the goods yourself. So if something takes your fancy at a good price then this is a good option if you can?t get it cheaper elsewhere. This is where I?ve had mixed blessings with the online company. Around Christmas time there was a promotional link that gave you 10% off. With this link I promptly ordered Cheers and Frasier Season One DVD Set?s for an extremely good £13.49 each. I asked for them to be delivered to my local store. The online ordering process was the same as any other and there was little hassle in arranging the in-store pick-up. A few days later I got a phone call informing me my items were in; I picked them up and felt pleased with my purchase. This was largely due to the fact that I had previously ordered the same thing with the extremely poor SplashDVD and was still awaiting a shipping confirmation by the time I had the same goods from Smith in my hand. A few days later I went back when I found they had Season 5 of Sex and the City on offer for £13.49 using the link. I ordered on the 29/12 and expected a reasonably quick response. Sure enough my items were dispatched to my local store. I waited for a phone call, then I waited some more, and some more, still no phone call. I popped into the store and they hadn?t received anything. This was now 2 weeks later so I contacted Smiths online, it appears the item had got lost in transit and they promptly sent out another copy to the store. Two days later I get a phone call to say the item is in. When I show up at the store I discover they have sent the wrong item. With this I phone the customer service departme nt and get the usual apologies. I manage to get one sent to me directly; I?m still waiting on that copy and believe me I wait with baited breath. It?s now nearly a month since I placed the initial order and for an item that is readily available it?s a bit of a joke when you consider the reputation of the company. I?m normally pretty passive about this sort of thing as mistakes can happen. But then I check my bank statements and find that they?ve charged me again for sending out the second copy. Needless to say I?ve sent an annoyed e-mail to the customer service department and I await a response. I?ve made countless purchases online and I have to say that the dedicated online retailers with the exception of Splash have always given great, speedy service. The online retailers with their basis in high street shops generally haven?t cottoned on to the concept of online shopping yet. I will be thinking twice about shopping online with Smiths again if this kind of thing occurs.

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WH Smith offer quite a good range of items. But have the baddest delievery charge ever. I mean they are just playing about. I shop for DVDs mostly online and mostly find that DVD Suppliers online offer Free postage and packing and also have lower prices. I have bought loads of things from WH Smith and found it to be quite Bad. The Price: I bought Friends Series 1-4 VHS paid £14.00 for it at the store - Expensiver espically when other stores where having the two Videos for £12.00 sale for Friends. The Postage and Packing: I am very dissapionted with the postage and packing seems to be very high and very slow delievery too. Other online company's well most of them offer Free postage and packaging. The Products: The products arrive in excellent quality, nicely packed and packaged and includes an invoice wiht the order deatils Customer Services: Quite nice peoplpe, but dont really symthaize and just tell you to wait and wait for you product to arrive to you. Ordering: They accept quite alot of Credit cards so it makes it very very easy for it order items, and the Online Shopping Basket makes it easier to shop. Overall: A Good service but i feel let down by the time you need your product buy. So my advice, Well if you want your product quick and cheaper shop elsewhere. if you are willing to wait a long time and pay high price for product and postgae and packing then the best advice i can only give you is dont choose WH Smith to do this!

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I've been using the internet for about 8 years now and I'm a heavy user (by which I don't mean I weigh a lot, but I am probably online for around 8 hours per day). However, I have only been a regular online shopper for the past 2 years or so. During this time, I have had no complaints at all and I have used a lot of different companies - amazon, bol, cd101, jungle, evesham, dabs and even Sainsburys and Tescos. Perhaps these companies are to blame for my current state of shock with WHSmith online. Maybe it's not actually Smith's fault that I expect next day delivery unless the item is not in stock when I expect a next-day email informing me of this. I expect to be able to log in to my account and instantly see the status of my orders (and the correct status I might add!). Perhaps I expect too much. I won't bore you with the full details of my ordering nightmare, but I will sum up what happened to back up my grievances. I placed an order for 2 DVD's with Smiths because, quite frankly, they were cheaper than anyone else at the time - offering a second DVD for half price after buying the first. The day after I had placed the order, I checked 'my orders' section of the website only to find, to my surprise, that they had no record of my order!! I kept checking daily over the next week or so, but my order never appeared. Of course, I assumed that my order had not been placed (how stupid of me!) and I re-ordered said DVD's. A day later, two identical orders now appeared on the my orders section of the website. Oh dear. Aha! I thought, perhaps I can cancel the most recent order, hopefully catching it before they had started to process it and just wait patiently for my first order to arrive. Of course, I wasn't able to cancel either of the orders, despite the website telling me that I should have been able to. I must point out at this stage that I was sending frequent emails to their support people impl oring them to sort out the mess as soon as possible. But, with delays of several days before getting any response at all from my emails the weeks had already dragged on. The upshot of this whole nightmare is that I eventually managed to cancel both my original orders. The time I had spent waiting for any of the DVD's to turn up was time thoroughly wasted when I could have got off my backside and bought them in a shop on any day of the week. The only advantage to buying online is that you don't have to get into town. But if I can't get what I want within a day of ordering, then I really don't want to know. Advice to WHSmith Online - I implore you, sort it out or get out of the business. Advice to the reader - avoid shopping online with Smith's at all costs. Make the effort to go into the shop, or use another online service (even if it is more expensive). MS

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This site run by WHSmith does not seem to have the ability to supply me any items (okay okay 1 turned up) Out of the 22 items that i ordered 21 had to be cancelled after 6 months of waiting. It wasnt as if the items were obscure, and the fact that they were listed on a popular shopping chains website gave me the impression that i would have no problems with them. In their defence i must say that the 1 item that turned up was with me the very next day and was in perfect condition. But they charge for delivery !!!!!! for a better CD service i would suggest audiostreet,jungle or cd-wow(for chart CDs)

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This website sells everything from books to computer games, and really is excellent. You register before you can place an order, and from then on it is simple. This site is easy to navigate, and has an excellent search facility if you know what you are looking for. They also seem to have a large range of stock as a couple of the items I have bought haven't been available anywhere else! The secure ordering is very easy and straight forward, using an online shoping basket, which is easy to view and change. Once you have placed an order, you receive a confirmation notice. From there you can track the progress of you order online. This is informative and reassuring, and saves endless calls chasing orders. Once the order is despatched, you receive notification by email, which is useful, as you know when to expect it. Athought the prices are not cheap, they aren't expensive either. You have to pay a pound or so for p&p, but this didn't matter, as I was happy to pay for the peace of mind and excellent service. This site is online shopping at its best. If they have it, order it!

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W H Smith are one of the major high street stores and stock a range of things from books to movies. I've used this site on a number of occasions and, on some items, they offer competitive prices. For me, this has tended to be CDs and books. My one complaint is that they have claimed to have an item available or will get it from their supplier. This can, and has, taken a considerable amount of time. In fact, I'm still waiting for a book that I ordered over 3 months ago. In fairness to them, they were the only UK supplier that claimed they could obtain a copy. This book is available in the USA so I'm not clear what the delay is. On the down side here, they do not keep you informed of progress or delays. I have just looked at their DVD range and prices and they do not appear to be very competitive with other suppliers, and there is quite a hefty postage charge on top of the stated price (minimum charge of £1.95 or 15% of total value, maximum charge of £6). The majority of DVD retailers offer free postage in the UK so I can only see them attracting people because of their name. They also offer a club card but, whilst you can earn points online, you have to visit a store to cash them in.